Metabolic and Cellular Differences Between Sedentary and Active Individuals

Probably a better link for the post, the current article appears to be an AI generated ad

+1. I surf occasionally, and go rock climbing a couple times a week. Compared to the "average American" I suspect I'm pretty active. Compared to other rock climbers and surfers, I'm probably relatively inactive. If I'm not concerned about improving at these hobbies, and just want 80% of the health benefit of being active, am I achieving it? Or am I still below?

Edit: From the linked paper:

'''

2.1 Subject Recruitment Nineteen male subjects ((41.9 ± 13.8 years; 82.6 ± 13.9 kg)) participated in this study and were assigned a research arm based upon meeting one of the following criteria related to physical activity:

- Sedentary (SED): n= 10. Does not perform exercise regularly or elevate heart rate outside of daily tasks

- Active (AC): n=10. Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week, and has at least a six-month history of doing so

'''

I bet that "Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week" is related to some standard advice (but I'm too lazy to confirm that. I guess that provides an easy measuring stick to decide if we're being 'active enough'

According to the linked paper [0]:

"

- Sedentary (SED): Does not perform exercise regularly or elevate heart rate outside of daily tasks

- Active (AC): Performs aerobic exercise for at least 150 minutes per week, and has at least a six-month history of doing so

"

A more comprehensive study that determines the optimal amount of exercise per week to achieve peak cellular function over a population would be quite interesting. Also, what about anaerobic exercises like weight lifting? What's the relative impact on metabolic function? Lots more to explore here!

[0] https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.08.19.608601v1....

The best indicator of fitness is your VO2 max value and this can be estimated using fitness trackers and smart watches. You should try to be in the top 10% for your age bracket. The higher the better as all cause mortality decreases as VO2 max increases.

The paper indicated the Active group has doing at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity throughout the week, or 75 minutes of high intensity activity activity (matching WHO guidelines[0]), and have done so for at least six months.

Anecdotally, I and several other people have found smart watches good for keeping track of intensity minutes.

[0] https://www.who.int/initiatives/behealthy/physical-activity

Can you look in the mirror without feeling ashamed?

There's a mention in this article a measurement of various epigenetic clocks but one would have to measure a baseline then try increasing or decreasing to see the effect on test results.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2501185-our-bodies-are-...

I like the reenvisioning thoughts here. We're well overdue a Minority Report style upgrade to our I/O peripherals, with keyboard and mouse being relegated to backup use.

We have/had a few things which could help (Leap Motion controller, Kinect, etc), but it's really hard to imagine how to generalize interfaces for these new device forms so they're at least on par with the old from a productivity perspective. Otherwise, people outside of research and maybe gaming won't really be sold on it.

tl;dr; Nope.

Assuming that HIIT workouts are 100% vigorous activity (unlikely), then a "few" instances would only add up to around 24 minutes of vigorous activity, which is far short of the minimum recommended 75 minutes of vigorous activity.

If you are short on time then performing HIIT for 15 minutes five days a week will get you much closer to the minimum requirements.

It's better than nothing. It's better than likely some multiple of that in lower effort activities. But you probably want to round it out a little bit.

It almost certainly will improve your VO2MAX.

Maybe but if that's literally all you do then your joints are going to be wallpaper paste by the time you're middle aged

I’ve been chronically ill for 11 years now. I wasn’t really exercising basically at all for 8 of them then I started walking 3 years ago and jogging 1 year ago and cycling 6 months ago. My VO2 max was 52 at age 24. 40 when tested a year later after becoming sick. I had it retested a year ago and it was 36.5. But I ran a 5:59 mile a month ago so it is very likely higher now. But I haven’t been able to get it retested since it is expensive. But my general health has massively improved in the past 6 months. I cycle 10-20 miles a day every day. I had like diastolic heart dysfunction and tons of arrhythmia showing up years ago and had a heart monitor redone this year and the rhythm is back to what it looked like before I became ill. I’m still sick but just seems like I have more vitality anyway now despite that.

I didn’t strength train until my 40s. Started being able to curl 15 pound weights. Now at the same reps I’m up to 20 or 25. Years later :)

It takes time. It’s a very steady climb. No doubt if I was a teenager I’d make much faster progress.

But it’s not just about the raw amount of weights, my running pace, etc. The benefits for my mental health in the moment. Improving my sleep and stress. And myriad other benefits make it worth it.

That's not really a relevant question, actually.

We know definitively that active is strictly better than inactive in all respects unless someone has such severe end stage cardiorespiratory issues that they risk actual death, or some other unusual condition that makes exercise contraindicated, in which case, of course, speak to a doctor and obey their advice.

Even if it merely preserves function (which I would be skeptical about, humans are amazingly adaptive), the alternative is inactivity and thus gradual loss of function indefinitely over time until death.

It's not a question of trade-offs or utility. The sooner you intervene the more effective your interventions will be, sure, but it's hard for me to imagine a situation where there's absolutely no point in doing something about a sedentary lifestyle. It might be harder to improve your outcomes if you've already developed comorbidities but if one cares at all about living longer I don't see why that person should let perfect be the enemy of good.

Don't feel bad about your VO2 max, the baseline and ceiling are largely genetic. Most people can only bump VO2 max by about 10-15% even with absurd training regimens. Same goes with many of the markers people track - you can control them to an extent, but some people just have high blood pressure or poor lipid profiles and thus need intervention.

Obesity is an independent risk factor, even if otherwise active/healthy. It's worth getting under control for lifespan and healthspan.

BMI isn't a great predictor of health. Waist-to-hip ratio and body-fat percentage are probably somewhat better indicators.

https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/why-you-shouldnt-rely-on-b...

Isn't 12k steps like 6 miles? I could plausibly jog that much, but to walk it every day seems like a huge time commitment.

People must have very different definitions of HIIT because there's no way someone is sustaining a 2 minute absolute max-effort sprint.

Anaerobic training’s returns increase ridiculously with days/week until about 3 and it’s large diminishing returns after that.

Just saying, once you’re willing to lift weights once a week with all the upfront cost (gym membership, leaving your comfort zone, learning the ropes, etc) it’s a really good bang for your buck adding one or two more.

I love when exercise is hyper-optimized as possible so I can back to what's most important: working at a job I actually hate to make as much money as possible -- the real source of my happiness.

Walking 2 hours per day is a completely impractical fantasy.

A better resource: Body By Science a book containing recommendations based on research and data. The overall goal is proper volume of effective effort of cardio and strength exercise that doesn't take too long and reduces risks of wear/tear and injury.

The manual for a human body says several hours of exercise per day.

Children try to follow it, but it's being made hard for them, and by the time you're an adult most have learned to forget the natural instincts for movement and how much fun you can have doing physical exercise.

12000 steps is around 10km. And takes around 2-2.5 hours of walking. So I say it is total baloney. Only very few people can do that amount of walking daily. Plus after you do a 2+ hour walk your body next day needs time to recuperate. As an added note it could be utterly boring to walk the same route again and again.

Rather do 6 km slow running 2 or 3 times a week (of course if you are not severely overweight). You can do that in one hour and one running session is enough for 2-3 days. It also strenghtens your core and every other muscle in your body. You will also eat less. If you can mix it with strength training that includes your 4 headed leg muscles you will feel yourself like a champ.

Lot of literature is absolute hogwash in this space because most of them is theoretical and they regurgitate the same old bs. Like idiots saying running half an hour is 400 kcal :D.

Your body is a system, and not a robot or an engine that needs x amount of gas and oil to go for y kilometers.

The separate HIIT is probably not necessary if you vary your weight training to include higher volume sets. If you do a true HIIT sprint set at 100 percent effort like the initial journal article, you will be wiped out the rest of the day, it’s not practical.

Here is a study that tries to answer that question: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-024-02120-2

A good summary: https://bannister.coach/mitochondria-and-exercise-how-differ...

Quoting the conclusion:

> In this systematic review and meta-regression covering ~ 50 years of research data, we demonstrate that the magnitude of change in mitochondrial content, capillarization, and VO2 max to exercise training is largely determined by the initial fitness level. The ability to adapt to exercise training is maintained throughout life irrespective of sex and presence of disease. Larger training volumes (higher training frequency per week and larger number of training weeks) and higher training intensities (per hour of training, SIT > HIT > ET) are associated with greater increases in mitochondrial content and VO2 max. Therefore, training load (volume x intensity) is a robust predictor of changes in mitochondrial content and VO2 max. Increases in capillarization occur primarily in the early stages of exercise training (< 4 weeks) with ET, HIT, and SIT equally enhancing capillaries per fiber, while ET is more effective in increasing capillary density (capillaries per mm²) due to less pronounced muscle fiber hypertrophy.

There's no such thing as "ideal". From what I understand from the research, more fitness is correlated with better health outcomes, even up to advanced to elite level. I recommend trying out a number of different exercise modalities and schedules and seeing what you enjoy, what makes you feel the best, and what fits into your life.

The 2019 physical activity guidelines for Americans include consensus recommendations including the evidence and some good graphs to visualize the "bang for buck"

For those curious, those (weekly) recommendations are: twice weekly resistance training, and 150-300min moderate intensity aerobic activity, or 75-150min vigorous aerobic activity.

If you want a program to just give you a starting point, I highly recommend Barbell Medicine's (free) "Beginner Prescription"

Playing 12s on maimai DX makes my arms sore. Is that HIIT? :P

> so its hard to be sure

Who is asking you to be sure in the first place? Why do you need this certainty? Farm animals need the comfort and stability of the farm to survive. They "flourish" within the parameters some one else sets.

In the Elephant-Rider model of how the mind works, people are talking to rider And the elephant.

The elephant just needs some feel good stuff, to momentarily focus shift away from all the unpredictability in the universe, it has no control over - in this case it is being fed - well the story teller who is not sure about anything is atleast "diligent".

When you let go of the story, and realize the elephant is not under your control and can never be, the ride is much smoother. And that's the only story, no SEO game needed to promote the Truth. And truth is - you are just along for the ride. Don't act like a farm animal thinking you are healthy based on how many eggs you have been told to lay. You are a chimp. All animal domestication protocols break down sooner or later when dealing with chimps. Cuz the chimp mind has an elephant in it. Taking it for a wild ride.

How about just moving around for 30 minutes most days?

Supplements aren't going to help you mentally as a nice walk in the park.

I quite literally was thinking as I was reading your second paragraph, "hey, they should try swimming" - turns out you're well ahead of me!

I started about four years ago, and it's been awesome for me too. For me I tried it because I just never liked how running makes me feel in my chest, whereas the aerobic intensity of swimming (slower burn in zones 2 and 3) feels way better to me.

For anyone starting out, there is a bit of a hump to get over as you get some technique (I just used YouTube videos and feel). For a bit of an idea of how it can be to start, when my then-girlfriend (now wife) started coming along to some of my sessions, she had done three half marathons and was training for her fourth, but she couldn't swim 50m of freestyle in one go without a break! I remember doing two laps, having a break, then some breastroke, break, etc., whereas now I can pretty easily punch out 600m freestyle sets fairly fast before a break, or do 2km without stopping at a bit of a slower pace.

I've been trying to get into swimming for years, but being on the ADHD-side instead, I just find it intolerably boring >.<

You should look into Moe Norman. Legendary golfer on the spectrum. You might catch the bug like he did. A round of golf is about 5-6 miles of walking.

I love swimming but it’s incredibly inaccessible for me. I don’t own a pool, the closet public pool is 20 minutes away and doesn’t have lane rental so I can’t consistently do laps, and everything is outdoors so it’s sun poisoning or winter temperatures for most of the year.